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By Jason Bourgeois
This month, we're going way off the beaten path, for a change. Marvel? DC? Who are they? We're going for a little independent comic, from Slave Labor Graphics, with the newly revived property, based on the original, Disney cartoon that went off the year ten years ago, Gargoyles.
Back in the day, Gargoyles was a big departure for Disney. They had spent several years building up their Disney Afternoon television block, on every afternoon in many markets, a two-hour chunk of half hour cartoons on every weekday. Most of the shows were typical Disney fair, the light, goofy (Pun intended), family oriented, light shows, such as Duck Tales, Gummi Bears, and Chip & Dale's Rescue Rangers.
Like many cartoons, any episode was pretty much interchangeable, with the only real continuity being when villains would show up from past episodes, and even that was pretty light, and nothing ever really built to anything, aside from the rare, larger story arc they would do. It was all about the jokes, with occasional character moments, but overall, everything was pretty light, and just for popcorn kiddie/family entertainment.
Then along came Gargoyles. Originally, the cartoon was pitched in much the same vein as the other shows, with a group of silly characters having light and fun adventures, but somewhere along the way, the folks working on the show decided to take the show in an entirely different direction. The art direction leaned away from cute and cuddly, and moved more towards the darker, gritty world that had been made popular with such shows as Batman Adventures. As for the stories, they realised that with a property like gargoyles, they had something that reached across history, and could developed a giant tapestry for a backstory, if the show did well enough, and the potential was near endless. This show was much more serious, with characters being killed, albeit those deaths were mostly stone statues, or the occasional, classic Disney 'falling off a ledge' death, to get past censors and into the hands of the viewers. While the characters had a definite sense of humour, and there were jokes, the show was treated in a serious, more grownup manner, and the characters were more well-rounded than the normal cartoon character.
Even their main villain, David Xanatos, had many layers. He had his good side, and it was actually quite large. He was ruthless, but he had a heart, and a strength of character that made him more than your typical bad guy. He was made into a real person, and not a cackling madman. The same goes for all the villains, each one developed, and their downfall shown, and you could almost sympathise with how an otherwise normal person (Or gargoyle as the case may be) may have turned towards the sides they did.
Each episode built upon the last, building a greater and richer world than almost any other that had been created in American cartoons, and events occurred that would carry over from one episode to the next, changes happened to the characters, good and bad, that would leave them forever altered in the future episodes. While each episode told it's own story, complete and fulfilling as a part, there were threads and pieces that would be put together as the series went on, building towards even greater things, hints and clues as to the future of the show being left out, ready to be found for anyone who was willing to look.
For me, everyone was talking about the show. We would come in to school the next morning, if we hadn't gotten together after school to catch the episode as a group, and talk about it, discussing those clues, those hints, making theories. This was probably the first 'watercooler' type show I'd gotten into, and I loved it. It took everything I loved from comics, and brought it onto the TV screen.
Sadly, after 65 episodes, one of the main voices of the show, Greg Weisman, left the show, as it was being changed and put on ABC Saturday mornings only, taking it out of the daily strip format. Along with that change, the show ditched much of what had made it so successful in the first place. It placed stronger focus on a few characters, over the ensemble, the strong continuity that had been built up was tossed aside for more, smaller, lighter stories, and the show didn't really go anywhere in the short life it had left in it.
I didn't know any of this at the time, but I could see the changes, and to this day I have yet to see all the episodes. It just wasn't the show everyone had fallen in love with anymore. Years later, once I had found myself online, I eventually stumbled into Gargoyles fandom, and found all the dark, dirty details of what had happened, and watched the campaign to bring Gargoyles back from the grave, eagerly hoping that some day, it would happen.
That day finally came, and while it's not a new TV show, the Gargoyles are back, in comic form.
Greg himself is the writer of the comic, picking up not exactly where he left off. He wrote one episode, the first, of the Goliath Chronicles, before leaving the show, and much of that episode has been adapted into this introductory issue of the new comic series.
At first, this disappointed me, since it was a story I had already seen, and had negative connotations with me, due to how the show had treated the product overall, even though that first episode was not bad at all.
Upon further reflection, however, the story makes perfect sense to start a new series with, for many of the same reasons it worked so well for any new viewers of the Goliath Chronicles. The gargoyles had been revealed to the world, after remaining hidden from the majority of humanity throughout the series, and this first issue, as well as that first episode it was created from, sets up that new status quo for one and all. It's also much easier to say that the main Gargoyles series is canon, and kick off from there, rather than "The 65 episodes of Gargoyles, and that first episode of TGC," which is unwieldy, to say the least. Also, with the way the original series ended, there was very few next stories you could tell, and this is the most likely choice to go in.
While these reasons make perfect sense, it is still a 'repeat' in a sense, but the book is still well-written, and once this introductory story is over with, then there is a promise of all new adventures from here on out, so while the complaint may be a big one, it certainly doesn't dull my anticipation for more, and the joy to have Gargoyles back in my hands. Having old friends back is a good feeling, even if there's a sense of deja vu. And I don't put it past Greg to have adapted most of that initial episode, to go in a completely different direction in the second issue, rather than adapt whole-cloth the remainder of the episode yet to be seen.
The book also expands on a few moments from the episode - I think, it has been forever since I've seen it, so maybe I just forgot those moments, and the art slips perfectly into the Gargoyles style, while still forging ahead in it's own style. All in all, it's a good sign for the future of the series. Good writing and art coming together to carry on a property that died long before it's time.
If you were a fan of the original series, then this is a definite must-read for you, even if you've seen the episode this was originally presented as, since it serves as a decent reintroduction to the series, characters and concepts, although I wouldn't blame anyone for feeling like they should maybe come in with the second or third issue, when the new stories begin.
Jason M. Bourgeois
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